


A new home

by Abby_tabby



Category: Raggedy Ann & Andy Series - Johnny Gruelle, Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure (1977)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Childhood, Dolls, Fantasy, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-22 14:13:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 3,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30039906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abby_tabby/pseuds/Abby_tabby
Summary: Raggedy Ann, raggedy Andy, Babette, and the camel listen closely to the voices beneath the attic. How long has it truely been since they’ve been held? What is this bright rectangle with pictures on it? And how is Marcella still young when they were sure that the years have passed on?
Relationships: Raggedy Ann/Babette
Kudos: 13





	1. Part 1

Raggedy Ann woke to the sound of something new, a voice that reminded her of Marcella, the girl that owned her once before. 

Her eyes grew cloudy with tears from the cherished memories that flooded to her mind, the ones before all she knew was the dusty attic she now resides in. 

“Andy, Andy.” She whispered for her brother. The other rag doll sat up with a groan, his eyes tired and his temper growing shorter over time. “Yes Ann?” He couldn’t look at his sister, her torn fabrics getting worse and worse, though he could almost compare. “Downstairs, do you hear it.” He listened closely, eyes widening as he heard it too, a voice that differed from the rest, a young girl, one that sounded exactly like Marcella. 

“Could it be? No that’s foolish.” He doubted, knowing that the voice really couldn’t have been her, it had been too long. 

The two focused on the words the voice spoke. 

“You’re free to stay till the storm subsides.” An older raspy voice welcomed the others in, a door creaks loud, sending a shudder through the raggedies. 

“Of course, come on Marcella.” Another voice said, controlling, almost like their Marcella's mother. 

“Marcella?” Andy said confused, watching as his sisters face gleamed with excitement. “Marcella!” She squealed, looking as if she could lift the latch herself and run into the girls hands. 

“Alright.” The voice they heard before spoke once more, the voice they could assume was Marcella.


	2. Part 2

Another moment had passed in silence, the only sounds heard were the pitter patter of raindrops hitting the roof and the whizzing of wild winds. 

“Had they gone to sleep?” Ann asked,feelings diminished once again, losing hope that she’d ever get to be played with again. “Perhaps,” Andy began, looking down at Ann as she slumped sadly to the floor. “Don’t worry too much Ann, it’ll be alright.” He wrapped an open arm around her, sitting quietly as they listened to the pouring rain. 

“Is she back?” A head arose from one of the boxes, his two ears poking up as he fumbled clumsily out onto the attic floor. “No camel, not yet.” Andy sighed, still holding onto his sister. 

“Like I said, why don’t we just leave?” Babette arose from the box as well, her tone harsh and demeaning. 

“If Ann wants to stay, then we stay.” Andy reminded her, paying no attention to the french doll. 

Ann scanned the room, the boxes she had known for years now were just as damaged as she were, the dust collecting all around, all over her friends. “Andy, what if we could leave?” 

“Leave? But I thought you wanted to wait for her?” He said confused, watching as Ann stood up. 

“But what if she doesn’t, and we’re still stuck here?” She began to sob, her ripped sleeves putting in effort to dry them up. 

“If it’s what you want, I’ll look for an exit.” He said, something in his voice happy and eager to leave.


	3. Part 3

Andy constructed a plan inside his head, one that would insure the safety of everyone. He could risk more tears, rips, or cracks. 

“We could escape through that door right there.” He began, attentive eyes huddled around him. “We’ll all open it and look down below to be sure no ones looking.” He looked at Ann. “Do we have blankets up here?” He asked, following with Ann hopping up again, her head peeking throughout each box till she found the one. 

“Yes, right here.” She carefully dragged out a couple of blankets, making sure to not put tension on her already ripping seams. She placed them in front of Andy, giving a confused look before he began to explain what they were for. 

“We could tie em together, create a rope of some sort.” The other toys nodded, laying the blankets in a line and tying the edges. “Will this even work?” Babette asked, feeling the dusty fabric between her porcelain fingers, the once soft texture she felt before now matted and rough. 

“It better, it’s the only plan I got.” Andy said, tightening the knots between each blanket. 

The dolls went over towards the attic door, lifting the loose metal latch, and pulling up the wooden door. Everyone heaved the heavy wood, making sure to put in as much effort as they could. 

They carefully pushed the door open, a small noise echoing as the wood hit the floor with a thud. Dust flied out, causing a chorus of sneezing and coughing. 

Andy grabbed the end or the rope between his hands tightly, signaling the dolls to begin letting him down. 

He looked up as the door began to get smaller and the floor closer. He rummaged through his pocket, pulling out a small paper daisy to give him back his confidence. 

He had no clue what he’d find, but he was sure there was an exit somewhere, there had to be. 

He stepped onto the floor, allowing the others to pull the blanket rope back into the attic. The house was much bigger than anticipated, the floors a worn hardwood, the walls adorned with decorations of paintings and other knick-knacks. It was somewhat familiar, like his old home, but aged, grown older like he had. 

He saw something vibrant atop of a dresser, it’s finish almost sparkling in the moonlight from a nearby window.


	4. Part 4

Andy climbed up by the dresser drawer handles, reaching the top in only a couple seconds. 

Once there, he eyed the strange reflective rectangle, picking it up and analyzing its lightweight features. He pressed a button on the side, a now illuminated screen flashing into his button eyes. He blinked for a moment, his hand in front of his eyes as it shielded the bright glow. 

“What the?” He mumbled to himself, pressing the button again and the light immediately absent from the screen. 

He heard noises from afar, perhaps a stir in sleep? Either way, he had to hurry before he was destined to be seen. 

He climbed back down the dresser, running to below the attic. 

“Hurry.” He whispered, seeing as the rope was already lowering towards him. As it reached him, he hopped on, holding tightly as he did before. 

The other dolls pulled him up quickly, grabbing his arms and assuring him that he was finally back into the attic. 

“Well? What did ya see?” Ann asked, eyeing whatever Andy was holding. 

“This.” He held it up as Babette and the camel closed the attic door. 

All the dolls huddled around, watching as Andy pressed into the button once again. “What is that?” The camel asked, squinting at the bright screen in front of him. 

“No clue! It's pretty strange ain’t it?” Andy made distance between him and the bright screen to get a better look. The bright light was really a picture, one of a butterfly, the colors just as, if not more, vibrant than the outside. 

“Wow, it’s really pretty.” Ann smiled, reaching for the screen. Andy held it out to her, her hands swiping on the screen. Something opened, revealing more brightly colored squares, some with letters, others with more pretty pictures. 

“How’d you do that?” Andy looked amazed. “Just touched it, mighty strange huh?” She laughed, continuing to swipe at the screen. 

The dolls heard another noise, listening close to the voices. 

“Where’d it go?” Marcella spoke, followed by another. “That’s strange, maybe you left it somewhere else?” The older raspy voice said. Some rumbling around arose some curiosity in the dolls. 

“I have something that could keep you busy.” The voice was even closer now, too close. 

Andy shoved the rectangle into his pocket, going limp as a head peered through the attic door. A hand reached for the dolls, wrapping two gentle arms around all of them.


	5. Part 5

Her grandmother set the 4 dolls on a nearby drawer, smiling at Marcella as she stared at their broken parts and ripped seams. “I’ve got these dolls here, and they’re very important to me.” She spoke. 

“Could you perhaps fix them for me?” Her grandmother motioned to a box which Marcella quickly noticed was filled with patches of fabric, sewing needles, and thread. 

“Of course.” Marcella said kindly, picking each doll up and holding them between her two arms. 

She went into the guest bedroom her grandmother let her stay in, a small tidy twin bed sat in the middle, accompanied by a worn carpet floor, and very minimal decorations of portraits and landscape paintings. 

She held one of the dolls up, her body had already shown signs of being fixed before, some with fabrics of different colors, others with the stitching of her face. “Grandmother must’ve loved you.” She felt the dolls yarn hair between her fingertips the texture a bit rough and matted with dust. “Well, someone did once.”

She laughed to herself, pulling out the sewing needle and thread, making sure to match it to the seams that were already there. 

Stitch by stitch she closed back up all the holes and tears, looking at her work every second or so. She was proud of her work, yet she noticed whoever worked on the doll before was much more experienced than her. 

Once done, she smoothed the dolls dress out and placed her on the bed. 

She picked up a similar doll, his hair a brighter orange red, but his condition much worse. “You must be super tough to have all these rips and tears.” She said to him, taking his little blue hat off to work on it first. 

She sewed up the rips along the top carefully, keeping her face close as she kept an intense focus on her work. 

After she had done her best, she placed back upon the doll's orange hair again, placing the strands back into place as it was before. 

She took his hand, rolling up the sleeves to reveal more rips underneath, bits of stuffing spilling through the white fabric. She pulled the needle and thread through, her pace quickening as she learned a faster technique.

It was almost rhythmic, the stitching going through the length of his arm like melody. She smiled once again, the enjoyment she got from sewing something so precious wasn’t so easily described by words. 

She switched to the other arm, and yet again, she got a magical feeling of happiness, a song filling her mind until she finished sewing. 

“You’ve got strong arms again.” She placed the sleeves back, looking for any more rips and tears. 

She felt over something hard in the doll’s pocket, soon realizing that it was nothing ordinary. 

“My phone!” She lifted it up, looking back down at the doll on her lap as if it were to explain to her how it had gotten there. 

She remembered her grandma opening the attic up, how the dolls had been in there, and that there was no way it could’ve just ended up in the doll’s pocket. 

Perhaps her grandmother had seen it nearby, and placed it into the doll's pocket? That was the most reasonable guess she had. 

She placed the phone down on the bed, ignoring it as she had more work to do, 2 more dolls to fix.


	6. Part 6

Marcella picked up the next doll, a camel. The camels humps were a bit flat, bits of fabric contrasting with the blue of what she could assume was what he was originally made with. She felt over fabric, the blue was a strong felt like material, soft, but worn over years of love.

She selected a piece of scrap fabric from the sewing box, placing it over a large rip and sewing it in place. 

“A new one to the collection” she thought smiling happily as there was sure to be more to come. 

She gathered a couple more pieces of fabric, sewing them over rips and holes. The pulled thread through the busted seams, deciding that they didn’t need extra fabric like the others. 

She looked at her work once more before setting it down carefully with the others. 

She gently picked up the last one, a doll of porcelain with a dress of silk, clearly something that shouldn’t have been carelessly played with, yet she was. 

When the doll was sat upright, her eyes would fling open, a small “Babette.” Escaping a voice box from inside the doll. A large crack in the porcelain of her face stemmed from the top of her head to across her eyes. 

“Oh Babette, did someone drop you?” Marcella glided a finger across the crack, one that had been fixed before, but the glue only held on the inside. 

She thought of how to fix Babette, how she may only be capable of fixing her dress and bonnet. 

She examined the dress, minimal tears, but fraying began on the ends and edges of the silk, something that could be helped with a bit of thread and cutting from scissors. 

She trimmed the fraying ends, folding them over and sewing them back up, leaving a fresh clean edge. 

The dress began to look better, even though the rips in some places were almost impossible to hem and sew. 

Maybe grandma would understand her struggle to fix something so damaged and delicate, after all, she was only 12 years old. 

Could grandma fix something so unfixable? Could she mend the mistakes of the past or at least tell Marcella what had happened? 

She untangled Babette’s knotted hair, refining the curls and giving them back their soft and shining look.

Once done, Marcella gathered back up the dolls, placing them upon a drawer nearby. It was far too late to hand them back to grandma, so she would surprise her tomorrow. She hoped to herself that her grandmother would like their new looks, that whatever memory she had of them still remained. 

“Goodnight.” She said to them before flicking the light off and hopping back into bed.


	7. Part 7

“Ann.” A voice called, causing Ann to spring awake and look at her surroundings. 

“I can see perfect now! And my rips are all fixed!” She gushed about her new look, staring at the patches and stitching Marcella had done moments before. 

Someone exhaled with a tired sigh and Ann looked over to what was the matter. “Oh, Babette.” She looked at the French doll. Although her dress was fixed, and made pretty again, a frown still hung onto her face. 

“What’s the matter?” She moved around her brother to get closer to Babette, a porcelain hand helping her over to keep the noise level down. 

“I am ugly raggedy Ann, look at my face.” Babette whined, tears bubbling on the edge of her eyelids. Ann sat shocked, frowning at the harsh words Babette used to describe herself. 

“Babette.” Ann took her hand and held it tight between hers. “You’re the most beautiful doll I’ve ever laid my eyes on.” She spoke softly, cheeks burning a subtle red. 

“But I am broken! There is no way to fix me.” She looked away from Ann, hands still intertwined. 

“And? So you can’t be fixed, no big deal,” she cupped a hand around Babette’s cheek so she would face her. “That crack makes no difference to your beauty, it’s all about your heart.” She laid a kiss upon Babette’s forehead, watching her cheeks turn as red as she could imagine hers could be. 

Babette pulled Ann into a hug, mumbling things Ann couldn’t decipher, yet she knew they must’ve been sweet. 

“I love you raggedy Ann.” Babette spoke clearly, putting her head on Ann’s shoulder. 

“Love you too Babette.” Ann chuckled happily, pressing her face into the puff of Babette’s dress sleeve.


	8. Part 8

“You two sure are loud.” Andy yawned, standing up and peering over the two dolls' display of affection. 

“What if she wakes up, huh?” He watched the two separate, their faces burning hot from not only being caught, but realizing how loud they were being. 

“Sorry Andy, we’ll keep it down,” Ann stood up, giving a confused look to Andy as he stared below to the carpet floor. “Whatcha thinking about doing?” 

“We’re still leaving, aren’t we?” Andy said as he analyzed a way to get down from the dresser. 

Ann looked out at Marcella, then Babette, and lastly Andy, who’s hand was already out to help her down the drawer handles. 

“Well why should we? We’re fixed now aren’t we?” She spoke hesitantly, watching her brother's eyebrows furrow and his lip droop into a frown. 

“Annie, cmon now, you know we’ll just be put back up into that old dusty attic.” He looked up to the ceiling, shuddering at the possibility of being stuck up there once again. 

“But Andy, what if Marcella will take us back? What if we could go back to the nursery again? It’ll be just like old times.” She smiled, walking forward as she tried to convince Andy to stay. 

“There is no nursery Ann, this isn’t our Marcella, and the majority of our friends are gone! Nothing will ever be the same!” Andy felt something warm roll down his cheeks, the anger he felt now quick to turn to sadness. 

Ann backed off, balling her fists as she began to sob as well. 

Babette watched as the two siblings began to bicker back and forth, the level of noise quickly rising, and Marcella’s ability to stay asleep slowly becoming shortened. 

“You two, please.” Babette tried to calm them down from a distance, her eyes flicking between both the argument and Marcella’s bed. 

“I didn’t like being up there either, you know? I think of our friends every day.” She wiped tears from her eyes as she looked back on the memories. “I miss the way things were.” 

“That’s why we need to leave!” Andy was persistent, keeping the argument going as he thought of the logistics of things. 

“She won’t take us Ann, she has no clue who we are, or how important this is to you.” He motioned to the bed, laughing sarcastically through the tears that continued to fall from his eyes. 

“She will, I’m sure she understands what we’ve been through.” Ann protested, getting irritated at Andy’s pessimistic attitude.

“Then why don’t you ask her?” He argued, right as Marcella could take no more noise. 

Her eyes opened, widening as she sat up as saw the dolls standing on the dresser.


	9. Part 9

Marcella watched the dolls make eye contact with her, their faces panicked and bodies frozen in place. 

She slowly crept out of bed, the doll's eyes following her as she began to get closer. “You two, you can talk?” She asked, placing her hands on the dresser as she leveled herself to the dolls gaze. 

Ann looked at Andy, then back to Marcella, nervous to finally speak to a human, something that seemed almost forbidden. “Yes.” Ann spoke, backing up as Marcella stood up in amazement. 

“So even as I fixed you, you could’ve talked back the whole time? Wow, amazing.” Her eyes gleamed, eyeing each patch she had made on the dolls that she fixed. 

“Well, almost, we go in and out of sleep a lot.” Ann laughed awkwardly, not knowing what to say when she thought she knew beforehand. 

“Even you?” Marcella inched closer to the part of the dresser where Babette still sat quietly, her eyes avoiding the tall looming child’s. 

“Yes.” Babette spoke, standing up and dusting off her dress before walking towards Ann. 

“Even the camel over there.” Andy laughed sarcastically, pointing to the blue camel who still continued to snore since the time he was in the attic. 

Babette grabbed Ann’s shaking hand, her thumb going over Ann’s in an attempt to calm her down. “I’m a bit nervous too.” Babette whispered as Marcella was distracted with Andy’s mention of the camel. 

Ann smiled, sighing as Babette’s presence was a nice boost of confidence that she greatly needed, one that stopped the shudder in her voice and the shake in her hands. 

“Thank you.” She mumbled, watching as the camel began to wake up and notice Marcella’s stares. 

“Oh dear, we’ve been found out haven’t we?” He stood up, pulling on the wrinkles of his legs in an effort to straighten them. 

“Yeah, thanks to me and Ann.” Andy said, keeping an eye on every movement Marcella made, trying to calculate her unpredictable mannerisms. 

“Goodness, I have so many questions to ask, this is just so cool!” She thought of what to ask them, questions overflowing in her mind. 

“Before we get to that, I’d like to ask what your plan is with us?” Ann asked politely, silently hoping for the answer she’s been hoping for since she came out of the basement. 

“Well, I was going to give you back to grandma, but knowing that I might have someone to talk to, I’d like to take you home.” She smiled, kneeling back down to eye level with the dolls. 

“Someone to talk to?” Ann looked confused as Marcella’s brows furrowed in a sad manner. 

“I don’t have many friends, not really anyone to talk to.” She confessed, laughing it off as it sounded a bit funny talking about it, especially to a group of dolls. 

“We could be your friends, we’ve got plenty to talk about.” Andy said, hands on his hips as if to point out all the patched rips and seams that once told many stories. 

“That sounds very nice, but how do I even know that grandma will let me take you all?” She put her cheeks between her hands, falling back onto the carpet floor defeated without any ideas. 

The dolls peered over the edge, trying to come up with the ideas for her, some even being a bit promising. 

“Couldn’t you just ask her?” Andy suggested as Marcella put her arms onto the carpet in exhaustion. 

“I could, but you must be important to her, she’s never give you guys up.” She sighed, looking at the dolls on the dresser as she continued to lay down on the floor. 

“Important enough to leave in an attic for years at a time.” Babette scoffed. 

“Maybe I’ll ask her once she wakes up.” Marcella laughed, standing back up from the floor and lending a hand to the dolls as they got down from the dresser.


End file.
